Cistern
In every raindrop,
a ghost.
In every ghost,
a throat,
emptied. What drains:
a body, tide by
tide—appetite,
then thirst.
Air scissors through
to trickle.
Her current runs
through me,
then salt
in my mouth, ears.
In every cistern,
an ocean. Mere
meaning “pond,” “sea”
in Old English, or
in French, with accent
grave,
“mother.”
Elinor Ann Walker (she/her/hers) is the author of Fugitive but Gorgeous, winner of the 2024 Sheila-Na-Gig First Chap Prize (Sheila-Na-Gig Editions), and Give Sorrow (Whittle Micro-Press), both forthcoming. Recent and forthcoming poems appear in AGNI, Bayou Magazine, Bear Review, Nimrod, Plant-Human Quarterly, Plume, Poet Lore, The Southern Review, Terrain, Verse Daily, and elsewhere. She holds a Ph.D. in English from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, lives in the Appalachian foothills, and is on the poetry staff at River Heron Review.
